[The Party] will fight for a free, autonomous, united Macedonia
within the framework of the future European confederation, based on the
ideals of Ilinden . . . [for] the spiritual, political and economic union
of the . . . divided Macedonian people and state, within the framework
of a future Balkan union and a united Europe.

-- Extract from the IMRO Charter

June 17, 1990

Though overshadowed by war in Croatia and Bosnia, the "revival" of nationalism
in Macedonia has prompted concern among many analysts that an even worse
conflict might be kindled there.1
Among the sources of this concern are the emergence of a new IMRO (VMRO
in Macedonian)2 as
a leading political party in Macedonia, rising tensions between the Macedonian
majority and ethnic minorities (particularly Albanians), and the openly
irredentist rhetoric of many politicians -- both within and without the
republic.3 A recurring
feature in these nationalist contexts is an appeal to "the ideals of Ilinden,"
referring to a IMRO-led uprising against Turkish rule in the early part
of this century. IMRO-DPMNU invokes Ilinden in its charter.4
Two parties of ethnic Macedonians in Bulgaria have been named after this
uprising.5 The Macedonian
constitution states that its legitimacy rests "upon the statehood-legal
traditions of the Kru?evo Republic," a short-lived experiment in autonomous
rule which comprised the high water mark of the Uprising.6
The list goes on.

This essay will explore how the memory of the Ilinden Uprising has served
as a vehicle for nationalism, with particular attention to the ways in
which the socialist regime cultivated this memory for its own purposes.
It is commonly asserted that nationalism was "kept under control" in socialist
Yugoslavia -- that the hard line of the central government kept nationalism
"out of sight and out of mind." A closer inspection, however, reveals that
in Macedonia the socialist system actually stimulated nationalist attitudes
as a political expedient. While it is true that the vocabulary of this
nationalism was constrained by the Communist Party, all the elements of
post-socialist nationalism existed and thrived in the socialist period,
so that the fall of communism, rather than bringing nationalism out of
a deep freeze, merely changed the parameters for its discourse.

The Skopje-produced Macedonian Review, which began publication
in 1971,provides a fascinating perspective on nationalism during
the socialist period. Roughly 20 percent of the essays in the journal from
1971 to 1989specifically mention the Ilinden Uprising, and many
more address the general theme of Macedonian national identity.7
One might argue that the Macedonian Review, being an exclusively
English-language publication clearly designed for foreign readers, does
not present a useful view of the way the socialist elite propagandized
in Macedonia itself. However, an examination of the "Writers Included in
this Issue" section at the back of each number reveals that the bulk of
the contributors to The Macedonian Review ranked quite highly in
the socialist hierarchy of authority. University professors, bureaucrats,
and politicians, all closely linked with the Party, figure prominently
in the lists. Most articles, moreover, were translations or reworkings
of pieces that had first appeared in Macedonian publications. It would
also be naive to think that the emigr? community (which probably formed
the backbone of the Review's readership)8
was unimportant vis-?-vis "internal" Macedonian nationalism. The
sizeable presence of Australians, Canadians, and Americans at a 1984 meeting
of Aegean Macedonian refugees in Trnovo, suggests that Macedonians abroad
maintained considerable contact with their kindred in the Balkans.9

The Ilinden Uprising

The Ilinden Uprising was not the first armed attempt to establish a
degree of autonomy in the territory of Macedonia. The Uprisings of Razlog
in 1875, of Kresnensko and Razlo?ko in 1878, and of Gorno-Dzumajskiin 1902
had already raised the issue. Ilinden surpassed these earlier ventures,
however, in that it lasted longer and achieved more of its goals -- if
only temporarily. With the founding of the Kru?evo Republic in particular,
a precedent was set for Macedonian self-government which would remain a
source of national inspiration long after the Uprising had been crushed.

Much of Ilinden's relative success can be attributed to the fact that
it was better organized than previous uprisings. On October 23/November
4, 1893,10 six intellectuals
gathered in Salonika to make the final arrangements for a new association
of patriots dedicated to the autonomy of Macedonia.Originally dubbed the
Macedonian Revolutionary Committee or the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization,
the group would successively and alternatively be known as the Bulgarian-Macedonian-Adrianople
Revolutionary Organization (1896-1902), the Secret Macedonian-Adrianople
Revolutionary Organization or the Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary
Organization (1902-1905), and the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization
(1905 onward).11 Its
purpose was to inspire "a revolutionary spirit and awareness among the
population, and [to use] all possiblemeans for a swift and timely
arming of the population, as being necessary for a general and wide-spread
uprising."12

IMRO, however, was only the brightest star in a constellation of societies
that claimed Macedonian autonomy as their goal, some of which were also
based "internally" (i.e., within the Ottoman Empire), but more of which
had roots in Bulgaria or elsewhere. Most important of these were the Vrhovists
("Supremists"), a Sofia-based network that tended to view Macedonian autonomy
as a prelude to unification with Bulgaria, and which rivaled IMRO from
its creation in 1895. Through a remarkable interplay of intrigues and accidents,
a small internal association murkily allied with the Vrhovists united
with IMRO in 1900, and following the arrest of IMRO's Central Committee
in 1901, presidency of the organization fell to the Salonika-based leader
of the newcomers, Ivan Garvanov.13

At a January 1903 IMRO congress, Garvanov urged that an uprising be
launched in the spring of that year, and though many delegates argued that
their constituents were unprepared, in the end the congress voted unanimously
for rebellion. Through the influence of Goce Delcev, an affiliate of the
Central Committee who had been absent from the Salonika Congress, this
date was later postponed to late summer.14
In the intervening months Macedonia was organized into seven "revolutionary
regions," which were in turn divided into districts and communes.15
Under the direction of a Main Headquarters, each region set about stockpiling
food, clothing, and weapons, and systematically training IMRO supporters
for partisan warfare.16

The order to begin the Uprising went out from Main Headquarters on July
19/ August 1, -- the eve of St. Elijah's day (Ilinden) -- and managed to
reach the regions without being intercepted by the Turks. "Death is a thousand
times better than a life of misery," it proclaimed. "The day has been decided
when the people of all Macedonia and Odrin must come out gun in hand to
meet the enemy, and that day is 20 July, 1903.... Down with tyranny! Long
live the people, long live freedom!"17
The plan was to engage the Turks in guerrilla warfare, "using terrorist
and anarchist tactics," in a way that would prevent superior Ottoman forces
from quashing the Uprising quickly. By drawing out the conflict, it was
hoped that the Great Powers would eventually be driven to intervene on
Macedonia's behalf. Throughout Macedonia, rebels cut telephone and telegraph
lines, destroyed bridges, and attacked Turkish garrisons. In a handful
of districts (Klisura, Neveska, Smilevo, and Kru?evo) popular enthusiasm
propelled the Uprising beyond the level of partisan warfare envisioned
by the General Staff: Turkish garrisons and bureaucrats were driven out
completely, and autochthonous, revolutionary governments were installed.18
Of these, the most important was Kru?evo.

Operations near Kru?evo began at midnight on July 20/August 2, and by
4 p.m. the next day the town rested in rebel hands.19
Thereupon Nikola Karev, together with other members of the district staff,
"entered the town to an ecstatic welcome from the citizens," and declared
the Kru?evo Republic.20
Within days the new government established a hospital, bakeries, munitions
workshops, a revolutionary court, and a commission for the collection of
taxes. Steps were even taken to initiate a postal service and to issue
special stamps. Karev created a Council of sixty of Kru?evo's "prominent
citizens," with twenty drawn from each of the town's three major ethnic
groups (Slavs, Vlachs, and Orthodox Albanians).21
Out of this group, six were appointed to a "Temporary Rebel Government,"
again with each ethnicity represented equally. In an effort to expand the
territory of the new republic, the Rebel Government issued a manifesto
to the (predominantly Muslim) neighboring villages, inviting the inhabitants
to "come, and join forces under the flag of autonomous Macedonia."

Dear neighbors, Turks, Albanians, Moslems, we understand your
belief that the Turkish Empire is your empire and that you are not slaves
since your flag bears a moon and not a cross. You will soon find that this
is not so and that we are fighting, and will continue to fight, for you.
. . . If you treat us as your brothers, and if you wish us well, if you
think you can live with us, and if you are worthy sons of Mother Macedonia,
you can help us by not combining with the enemy and fighting against us.22

It was not long, however, before newly-mobilized Turkish forces arrived
to put an end to Kru?evo; the duration of the Republic's existence, depending
on who is telling the story, ranges from nine days to thirteen days to
several weeks.23
In mid-August, 18,000 Turkish infantry, cavalry, and artillery arrived
from Prilep. The General Staff urged the rebels to retreat, "to avoid endangering
the civilian population." Although a significant force under the leadership
of the Vlach Pitu Guli made a last stand at Meckin Kamen, by the end of
the day Kru?evo lay in Ottoman hands. Partisan struggles continued throughout
Macedonia, and Klisura managed to stay in rebel hands for a full three
weeks;24 but by the
end of October the Ilinden Uprising was over.

The "Second" Ilinden

It was only a matter of time before the tragedy of the Ilinden Uprising
was raised to the level of myth. Socialist IMRO member Dimo Hadzi Dimov,
in a pamphlet printed in 1924, prophetically wrote:

Macedonia has had its first Ilinden; it was followed by bloody
days of destruction and terrible suffering. There will be a second Ilinden,
in the new and safer age of the victories which are close at hand. This
second Ilinden is near, it is coming. And in that day those who still remain
from the first Ilinden will embrace their new leaders and rejoice in the
ideal they have achieved.25

This "new and safer age" was ushered in by the rise of German fascism and
the partisan efforts of Yugoslav Communists to defeat it. On the eve of
World War II, the Yugoslav Communist Party was in disrepute in Macedonia.
One reason was that the Party had condemned IMRO, alienating broad sections
of the population who still looked to the Internal Organization as the
most trustworthy exponent of their interests. More importantly, the mere
fact that the CPY was Yugoslav in orientation disturbed many Macedonians
who -- in light of their interwar experience -- connected Yugoslavism with
Serbianization.26
The Party sought to improve its position by appealing to Macedonian nationalism,
and Ilinden played a vital role in this process.
from Prilep. The General Staff

In 1940, Tito sent Svetozar Vukmanovic-Tempo to Skopje to "investigate
the situation" and bolster the Party's position.27
A new leadership was chosen for the Macedonian branch, and on August 2,
Tempo organized an Ilinden demonstration that attracted "several thousand"
participants. Party membership, however, did not climb above 300. With
the German invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941, most of Vardar Macedonia was
turned over to Bulgarian administration, and the CPY found itself in an
even more precarious position than before. Following nearly thirty years
of Serbian misrule, the Macedonian population generally regarded Bulgarian
occupation forces as liberators, and those few with sympathies toward communism
turned to the Bulgarian Party rather than to the Yugoslav. Tito sent communiqu?s
to the Macedonian branch urging its members to conceal arms from the invaders
or to join his nascent Partisan troops, but these directives were repeatedly
sabotaged by the Macedonian Secretary, Metodije ?atorov. Fortunately for
Tito, the Macedonians soon began to find Bulgarian rule less idyllic than
they had hoped, and with the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, Stalin
vocally supported the CPY's position in Macedonia.28
Tito dispatched the trustworthy Macedonian Lazar Koli?evski to Skopje to
form a Provisional Provincial Committee -- designed to parallel and then
to usurp the wayward party of ?atorov.29
On July 22, 1942, this Committee issued a Macedonian-language proclamation
encouraging the Macedonians "to take as an example the struggle of the
other Yugoslav peoples."30
The proclamation contained an appeal to develop the traditions of the Ilinden
Uprising, ending with the slogans "Long live the national liberation struggle
in Macedonia! Death to Fascism -- Liberty to the people!"

A new Central Committee of the Communist Party of Macedonia, installed
by Tempo in March of 1943, issued a proclamation in June of that year which
promised that "with the doctrine of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin, [we
will] develop still further the struggle of our people for the realization
of their centuries-old ideals."31
Tempo, disturbed by the dangerous potential for complete Macedonian independence
that lurked behind this statement, re-indoctrinated the CCCPM, which on
August 2 issued an Ilinden Manifesto exalting the National Liberation Army
and Commander Tito as the guarantors of freedom and equality for the Macedonian
people. Putting the Manifesto out on Ilinden, of course, was an obvious
appeal to Macedonian national sentiment. Tempo hoped that, with the intensification
of partisan warfare against the Germans and Italians, "a large number of
Old Ilinden fighters and political representatives" would orient themselves
toward the Communist Party.32

In 1944, with Axis power in retreat, Partisan activity in Macedonia
became widespread. The first meeting of the Anti-Fascist Assembly of National
Liberation of Macedonia (ANSOM) took place on August 2 (Ilinden). The Macedonian
People's Republic was proclaimed a federal unit of Yugoslavia, on a par
with Croatia, Serbia, and Slovenia. Macedonian was decreed the official
language, and national minorities were guaranteed "every right for a free
national life."33
Dimitar Vlahov, a former member of IMRO (United)34
was named president.

Socialist Uses of Ilinden

With the Socialist Republic of Macedonia thus founded upon a symbiosis
of socialism and nationalism, it remained a priority of the Communist Party
to preserve a viable balance. An overly strong nationalism could challenge
the Party's insistence on retaining Vardar Macedonia within the Yugoslav
federation. An overly weak nationalism, on the other hand, would expose
the Macedonian population to assimilatory propaganda from Bulgaria which
-- after the Tito/Stalin split -- became a serious concern.

The first task of the Yugoslav socialist was to legitimize the incorporation
of Vardar Macedonia within the Federal Republic. To this end, the establishment
of S.R. Macedonia on August 2, 1944 was hailed as a "second Ilinden," calling
to mind the vision of Dimo Hadzi Dimov. Embedded within this poetic and
prophetic symbolism was an unmistakable allusion to the New Testament concept
of a First and Second Coming of Christ. The first Ilinden, of course, represented
the First Coming, and ended with the crucifixion of the Macedonian nation
-- "Macedonia's Golgotha."35
There followed a long period of persecution of the "saints of 1903,"36
which culminated in the blood and fire of the Second World War (the Apocalypse)
and the second Ilinden (the Second Coming). Federal Yugoslavia, in other
words, was the Kingdom come.

The millenarianism that emerged from this conception of Macedonian history
relied on Ilinden as its gospel -- its founding myth. Entailed within this
myth were "the ideals of Ilinden," repeatedly invoked in order to justify
the socialist status quo and to encourage the people to support it.

Legitimizing Socialism

An atmospheric presence in Macedonian Review articles is the
concept of "the masses." Historian Hristo Andonov-Poljanski, in "Ilinden
1903," writes that "the masses [around Kru?evo] were enormously exploited
both economically and politically. The broad popular masseswere
those who suffered most."37
What the difference may be between "the masses" and "the broad popular
masses" we can only imagine, let alone how a country with less than two
million people can really be said to have "masses." As cross-culturalist
Heather Nehring reminds us, however, repetition of this kind is frequently
a signal that the point is an important one for the speaker, and we can
only conclude that Andonov-Poljanski is at pains to emphasize the role
of class conflict in early twentieth century Macedonia.38
"The broad Macedonian popular masses," he writes, "with an assistance of
the representatives of the nationalities in Macedonia, stood firm defending
their freedom and through the insurgent conflagration, looked for their
path to free existence and emancipation. The popular masses were the spiritens
movens of the Uprising and they in it, proved their revolutionary,
self-initiative and mass fighting spirit, that is why the Uprising from
its very beginning had a popular character. It was a typical popular uprising."39

Andonov-Poljanski, along with many other Review authors, interprets
the Ilinden Uprising as a "bourgeois-democratic" revolution. They generally
agree that this type of revolution "was the most suitable at the given
moment, and was a legitimate phase in the national and social liberation
of the Macedonian people,"40
but they are careful to maintain a certain distance from the bourgeoisie,
emphasizing that the "masses" were the motive force behind the Uprising.
"It was exactly through the act of revolution," Andonov-Poljanski insists,
"that the conscious initiative of the broad popular masses...found its
full expression, which had nothing in common with the provocations that
started the uprising."41
Krste Bitoski (also a historian) even goes so far as to criticize the central
command of the IMRO-led Uprising for not trusting the people enough.42

A popular theme of Review contributors was to discuss the socialist
activities of such renowned figures of the Uprising as Goce Delcev and
Nikola Karev.43 In
an article on Goce Delcev, for example, Macedonian National Assembly President
Nikola Mincev notes that Delcev's innovations in arms procurement attracted
the attention of Lenin, and Mincev praises Delcev for his ability to "revolutionize
the masses with warmth and enthusiasm."44
But the real accolades of socialist writers went to Nikola Karev, founder
of the Kru?evo Republic. Historian Orde Ivanovski explains that Karev had
worked since 1893 for the inclusion of socialists in IMRO, and that he
himself attended the First Socialist Conference in 1900. "The socialist
ideas which Karev preached to the workers and suppressed masses," moreover,
"were not limited to a pure class war, but were related to the Macedonian
reality." Ivanovski emphasizes that Karev, whose ideas "were quite correct
for the period," accepted the exigency of the bourgeois-democratic revolution,
and was therefore able to "affect" the national liberation struggle "to
great purpose."45
Both Delcev and Karev, incidentally, opposed the decision of the Salonika
Congress to begin the Uprising in 1903, arguing that "the masses were not
yet properly organized."46
Mincev and Ivanovski imply that if IMRO had listened to these men -- i.e.,
if it had followed a "correct approach towards the masses,"47
-- the Uprising would not have failed.

The Kru?evo Republic itself was frequently compared to that classic
symbol of revolutionary Marxism, the Paris Commune. In a short sketch,
historian Nikola Sotirovski notes that although "there is no evidence to
prove that the Macedonian revolutionaries were directly influenced by the
ideas and experiences of the Paris Commune.... the socialist Nikola Karev
and his Krushevo Republic must have been influenced" by them.48
To "prove" his theory, Sotirovski presents the similarity between the Commune's
governmental structure and that of Kru?evo. In particular, he points to
the Commune council as "a union of commissions which perform[ed] their
duties together, not a parliament in which everyone want[ed] to talk."
The Kru?evo Council of Sixty with its six commissions, Sotirovski argues,
acted in the same role. Unique for Kru?evo, of course, was the way in which
the Council and commissionerships were divided equally among the three
different nationalities, in a fashion destined to serve as a model for
the Balkans in the same way that the Paris Commune served as a model for
the world. Ljuben Lape corroborates Sotirovski's interpretation, and adds
the important insight that Kru?evo's national egalitarianism was the result
of the government's "correct approach towards the masses."

Thus, in a variety of ways, socialist propagandists sought to legitimize
the CPY by arguing the similarity and even identity of its programs with
something the Macedonians already held dear; at the same time, Macedonian
history was carefully fitted into the "correct" Marxist-Leninist mold.

Legitimizing Yugoslav Federalism

The CPY had secured its position in Vardar Macedonia by recognizing
Macedonian nationality and satisfying long-standing Macedonian demands
for regional autonomy. A severe challenge to this arrangement was the pre-war
affinity of Macedonians -- particularly IMRO-ists -- for Bulgaria,49
and continuing propaganda from Sofia which insisted that "Macedonians"
were really unfortunate Bulgarians enslaved by Yugoslavia.

Immediately following the war, when Bulgaria was in a weak political
position with respect to Yugoslavia, the CPB accepted the CPY position
on Macedonia to the point of an agreement that provided for the eventual
unification of Vardar and Pirin Macedonia within the federal structure
of Yugoslavia. Teachers, linguists, journalists, and even actors50
poured into the Pirin region from Yugoslavia, promoting Macedonian language
and culture and forging personal ties across the border. The Tito/Cominform
split of 1948, however, destroyed this cooperative arrangement, and Bulgaria
launched a vigorous propaganda campaign arguing that Macedonians were,
in fact, Bulgarians, and that the people of Vardar Macedonia should not
follow Tito's wayward path. Despite a brief rapprochement between 1955
and 1958, it remained the policy of communist Bulgaria to deny the legitimacy
of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia.

Contributors to The Macedonian Review addressed the issue by
presenting Macedonian history (and particularly the Ilinden Uprising) in
such a way that it emphasized the unity and indivisibility of the Macedonian
nation (not to mention its existence), and downplayed the ties of early
IMRO members with Bulgaria. It must be remembered that the nationalist
conception of Macedonia was geographic as well as ethnic, so that the Ilinden
Uprising had been launched not only where ethnic Macedonians happened to
live, but throughout the whole territory from Salonika to Skopje. Hence
the importance of the Kru?evo Republic, which "unified all the suppressed
and exploited national groups, without reference to religious and national
factors, into a single revolutionary front."51
Of course, the Macedonian nation was to be the cornerstone of a "unified"
Macedonia, and the Rebel Government's program "for directing the national
cause" was the concrete form by which "the unity of the masses" was symbolized.52
"The greatness of this turning point," in fact, "lies in the pure national
character
of the uprising which expressed the desire of the people for liberty and
for the creation of their own state."53

Arguments which rested on historical ties between Bulgaria and Macedonia
were countered by the position that these "ties" were actually part of
a plot by "the neighboring bourgeois monarchy"54
to subvert the Macedonian national awakening - to quash "the desire of
the people for liberty." In this "counter-revolutionary" and "quixotic"
quest,55 Bulgarian
mercantile companies were formed "to hinder and paralyze us," and the Bulgarian
Exarchate undertook an evolutionary program "for the gradual conversion
of Macedonian people into Bulgarians."56
Most nefarious of all, however, were Bulgarian attempts to undermine the
Macedonian revolution by filling IMRO with spies loyal to Sofia. According
to Andonov-Poljanski, who focuses on these Vrhovist sympathizers,
their "counter-revolutionary intents were particularly concealed under
the mask of the forced uprisings in order to provoke an outer intervention."57
Needless to say, the Vrhovists were blamed for the failure of the
Ilinden Uprising, leaving Bulgaria implicated as well. Interpreting the
Salonika Congress of 1903, Andonov-Poljanski writes that

according to I. Garvanov the assistance of Bulgaria was presumed...
The majority of the delegates voted in [his] favour... and it was decided
to start the uprising in the spring of 1903.

This forced decision for an uprising was actually a provocative action
of Vrhovism. It was strictly directed against the independent development
of the Macedonian national-liberation movement. Therefore, this evil solution
was strongly condemned by the most distinguished members of the Internal
Organisation and the Macedonian socialists as well.58

Thus, despite Goce Delcev's eventual success in persuading the Central
Committee to postpone the Uprising, Ilinden was doomed from the beginning.
Help from Bulgaria, in fact, never came. The failure of the Uprising was
therefore no fault of the good Macedonians; all blame rested on
the shoulders of "evil" foreigners.

Fortunately, the "Golgotha" brought on by the Uprising's betrayal was
superseded by the "Second Coming," when "Macedonians in a joint effort
with the other Yugoslav nations finally won their freedom."58
Tragically, though, "freedom came to only part of the enslaved fatherland."
It has already been mentioned that, immediately following World War II,
there was talk of an eventual political unification of Pirin and Vardar
Macedonia within the framework of Yugoslavia. The specific incident which
sparked this unprecedented display of socialist good will was a speech
delivered by Koli?evski to the First Congress of the People's Front of
Macedonia, on August 2, 1946:

The strivings of our people from Pirin Macedonia for
union with the Macedonian People's Republic are a clear fact.... [However]
we are convinced that the responsible factors...will make it possible for
our
people
in Pirin Macedonia to have those conditions of free national development
which the Bulgarian national minority enjoys in Yugoslavia. To raise the
question of union means common provocation, and is against the independence
and interests of the Macedonian people.60

Once again, the delivery of this speech on Ilinden was not coincidental,
and served to emblazon the issue in the Macedonian mind as well as the
Bulgarian. The effect was such that, within days, the Tenth Plenum of the
CPB declared itself in favor of Macedonian unification, and agreements
between Tito and Dimitrov were signed the next year.61
The Tito/Stalin split, of course, put an end to these plans. The CPY, realizing
that its point was lost, shifted to a focus on human rights for the Macedonian
minority in Pirin -- a minority which in 1956 Bulgaria ceased to recognize.
The
Macedonian Review took up the cause with repeated hues and cries about
the plight of the Pirin Macedonians. The very first issue contains a review
of a book whose "author points out to our neighbors, in a highly civilized
way, that they have not chosen the most honest way towards the solution
of the Macedonian question."62
The papers of a UN seminar on minorities, held at Ohrid in 1974, were translated
and published by the Review in 1977, and although the book does
not directly broach the topic of Macedonian minorities abroad, there are
pointed allusions.63

Macedonian minorities also existed in Greece and Albania, and the Review
pays no less attention to them than to Bulgaria. The Greek situation was
dealt with in a particularly bitter fashion, due to the large number of
Slavs who had fled during the Greek Civil War (1946-1949).64
The book review quoted above describes Greek policy as one of "denationalization
and assimilation, such as has no precedent even during the darkest period
of African colonialism."65
More reserve is afforded to Albania, where Macedonians were allowed such
rights as the use of their own language in elementary schools, but concern
was expressed that "Albanian authorities do not recognize the existence
of a Macedonian minority publicly and, therefore, this minority cannot
develop in the cultural or educational field."66

In addition to requiring a policy on external Macedonian minorities,
the assertion of Macedonian national autonomy within the Yugoslav context
also demanded a stable internal situation. The goal was to ensure that
the Macedonians -- like the Croats, Slovenes and Serbs -- had their own
national state, but without alienating members of other (potentially secessionist)
nationalities residing in Macedonia. To this end, Macedonian socialists
extolled IMRO and the Kru?evo Republic as native examples of cross-cultural
cooperation and brotherhood.

"Thanks to the justness of its principles," writes Lape, "[the IMRO
ensconced at Kru?evo] took in all dissidents regardless of nationality."67
IMRO had always admitted members of any nationality or faith, of course,
and Goce Delcev had declared that the world could be understood "only as
a field of cultural [as opposed to military] competition among nations."68
With the creation of the Kru?evo Republic, however, a truly unique state
of inter-ethnic cooperation was achieved. "Nowhere else in the Balkans,"
Lape says, "was the point so early and so justly raised... that the heterogeneous
mass of people belonging to different faiths have an equal right to determine
their own fate."69

The distribution of power equally among the major nationalities of the
Kru?evo Republic was a subtle yet important arrogation of the principle
of national equality as opposed to civic equality. It was
not through individual citizenship in the community that members of the
"heterogeneous mass" asserted their rights, it was through their national
apparatus. Thus Dimo Hadzi Dimov speaks of Kru?evo -- a town of less than
15,000 people -- as a "magnificent federation."70

"In that concrete political moment," says Andonov-Poljanski, "the Macedonian
people and the Minorities in Macedonia as its natural allies, took
the course of an autochthonous revolution."71
This statement makes it quite clear that the "equal rights" of ethnic groups
did not actually translate into equal position within the Republic. The
Uprising, after all, was a "national cause" which aimed at the establishment
of "a separate Macedonian state."72
National minorities, in other words, would share equal rights with the
majority in the national state of that majority. Unspoken was the
fact that this arrangement would render the position of the majority within
the "federation" a dominant, and potentially abusive one.

After Socialism

As we have seen, nationalism played a critical role in the establishment
and maintenance of Macedonian socialism. But this is not to say that a
dramatic shift in the nationalist tenor did not indeed begin in the late
1980s. In fact, a clear break can be seen in the Macedonian Review beginning
with the first issue of 1989. Articles dealing with history, language and
minorities abroad had always been standard fare, but in 1989 they began
to lose the socialist veneer which had previously coated them, exposing
the stark nationalism beneath. Some articles clearly "go off the deep end;"
Boris Vi?inski, for example, cites a Vatican document in which Alexander
the Great supposedly bequeathed a portion of his lands to the Slavs,73
and Radivoje Pesic argues that, based on archaeological evidence, the poet
Homer must have spoken a Slavonic dialect.74
An ever-present centerpiece in these most recent ruminations, however,
is the Ilinden Uprising.

Aharon Assa's "The Ilinden Uprising," in a 1989 issue dedicated to IMRO,
begins with a global perspective. "The Macedonian nation's Ilinden Uprising
was a lesson for the history of man as a whole," he avers, "a universal
epic of fearless revolutionary struggle."75
This is millenarianism of a kind which was absent from analyses of Ilinden
in previous Review volumes, which focused only on the millennial
importance of Ilinden within the context of the Balkan Peninsula. Assa
goes on to discuss the "Salonika assassinations" -- a series of bombings
perpetrated by Macedonian anarchists in the spring of 1903, which had been
a severe challenge to international support of Macedonian independence.

These desperate anarchists, who operated with the premeditated
desire to kill people, thereby arousing public opinion in the world and
drawing its attention to the Macedonian question, were known by the unpretentious
name of "Gemidzii" (Boatmen).... The "Boatmen" carried out their
devilish terrorist plan with wonderful precision and self-sacrifice on
the 29th of April, 1903.... Although the reverberations of the Salonika
attacks merge with the great, popular revolutionary tide of Ilinden where
Macedonian history is concerned, they did not, in fact, lead to any concrete
political results whatsoever. However, their moral quality was great.76

Assa, a Jewish Macedonian living in Israel, wraps up his article by focusing
on the role of Jews in the Ilinden Uprising. He notes that "anti-Semitic
poison never penetrated the hearts of the Macedonians,"77
and claims that, even during the Nazi occupation, Macedonians protected
the Jews.78 One cannot
help wondering if there is a certain usage of the word's creative power
here, in the hopes that by reminding the Macedonians that they have always
had a commendable relationship with the Jews, anti-Semitism will not be
a part of the nationalism which he otherwise espouses.

Ivan Katardziev's "I.M.O.R.O.," divided among two issues in 1990, provides
a contemporary view of IMRO's history from its founding in 1893 to the
present. The author focuses on demonstrating the eternal value of Ilinden
for Macedonian consciousness, and the importance of IMRO as the vehicle
of that consciousness:

The Ilinden Uprising is the great achievement of the "small"
Macedonian people. It is an example of a people's assault on the stars,
an example of self-sacrifice for the sake of freedom and the right to self
determination, carried out in spite of the joint actions of their adversaries....
This uprising played a very significant role in the development of the
Macedonian people's awareness of their unity throughout the whole territory
of Macedonia and of their spirit of oneness both there, in the Balkans,
and wherever else the diaspora might take them to. The Republic born of
this Uprising reflected most substantially the real goals of the Macedonian
people's revolution which was organized and led by the Internal Macedonian-Odrin
Revolutionary Organization. Its greatness established moral values aimed
at for ever after both by the people at that time and, after them, by their
descendants.79

In examining the evolution of IMRO following the Ilinden Uprising, Katardziev
(unlike many writers in socialist times) discusses at length some of the
more unsavory doings of the organization. He mentions, for example, that
both the right and left wings of IMRO (IMRO and IMRO-United) became fascist
during the late twenties, and that their clash rendered Pirin Macedonia
"a land of terror."80
Despite describing this transformation as a "degeneration," however, Katardziev
insists that "the Organization... never lost its Macedonian, independent,
national and political course.... On the contrary, despite all the abuse,
the authority of the Uprising and the Republic grew with the passage of
time, the consciousness of the blood shed for the sake of liberation and
for the right to self-organization became ever clearer. The Uprising and,
even more so, its very name, had turned into a myth."81

The power of this myth is revealed by its widespread invocation throughout
the contemporary Macedonian scene. Let us take IMRO as an example. When
given the freedom to express themselves politically outside the structures
of the Communist Party, thousands of Macedonians turned to the reincarnation
of IMRO (the Democratic Party of Macedonian National Unity) which claimed
to base its platform on "the ideals of Ilinden."82
Though it has renounced violence, this new IMRO has called for the unification
of Macedonia along geographic lines, and even proposed holding its 1991
party congress in Salonika. Since 1993 its support has been questionable,
but it has a firm base in the districts of Bitola and Prilep (the former
being the site of the Kru?evo Republic) and is increasingly attractive
to Macedonians dissatisfied with Albanian demands for self-rule.83
Such is the power of the IMRO name, moreover, that when IMRO-DPMNU members
decided to found a new party (in protest of IMRO-DPMNU's affiliation with
Serbian nationalists) they called it the IMRO-Democratic Party. Why, indeed,
is this myth so powerful?

The reason is that, in departing from socialism, the Macedonians (like
the Czechs, Estonians and others) consciously appealed to a prior paradigm.
Unlike the Czechs, however, the Macedonians have no memory of a stable
and prosperous "First Republic"; the only real, non-socialist, Macedonian
paradigm exists in the memory of IMRO, the Ilinden Uprising, and the Kru?evo
Republic. Furthermore, socialism did not expunge the nationalist tradition
in Macedonia in the same way that Czech socialism uprooted the traditions
of the First Republic. As Katherine Verdery notes, Yugoslav socialism "destroyed
all other bases for political organization while constitutionally
enshrining the national basis."84
Thus the memory of the prior paradigm is not the same memory that existed
in 1940, but one which has been molded and transformed by forty-five years
of socialist manipulation. One cannot easily discern where the seam that
connects nationalism and socialism lies; it is a viable argument that the
two are really different sides of the same coin.85

There is concern in Macedonia today that, because Macedonia is a small
nation, its culture and identity will somehow be drowned in the currents
of "big Europe."86
The imbroglio caused by Greek refusal to recognize Macedonia has posed
a severe test to Macedonian's faith in the outside world. The situation
cannot avoid leading some individuals to formulate Macedonia's position
today in the same way that Orde Ivanovski views the pre-war period:

Macedonia became an object of the aspirations of the great
powers and small Balkan states in the colonial and assimilatory competition
for the division of the Turkish inheritance on the Balkans. They all began
to exploit the Macedonian question as a means by which to further their
own plans for taking over the area. In this they ignored the efforts of
the Macedonian people directed towards their liberation and political and
national individuality.87

An old IMRO representative, Gjorce Petrov, once warned that "only with
our own strengths will what we gain be securely achieved,"88
and in light of Macedonia's international isolation, repetition of these
words by the new IMRO finds receptive listeners. Fears of isolation or
assimilation are a major reason behind the desire for Macedonian unity;
there is, after all, safety in numbers.

This desire for unity works in a multitude of ways. As Verdery notes,
it can be both inclusive, seeking the gathering of all Macedonians
into a common state, and exclusive, desiring the internal homogeneity
and purity of the nation.89
Already the strength of Albanian national sentiment in western Macedonia
has conflicted with a Macedonian desire "to ensure the perpetuation of
their national identity and the state in which they constitute a majority
population;"90 ethnic
Macedonians in these areas are among the most likely to vote for nationalist
parties like IMRO-DPMNU.91
Fortunately, however, the Macedonian nationalist tradition as it derives
from "the ideals of Ilinden" should, in theory, be tolerant of other nationalities
and supportive of their equal rights. This indeed seems to be the case
-- Macedonia has received EU commendation for her treatment of minorities,92
and that Macedonian treatment of the Romanies has been hailed as the best
in the Balkans.93
In speaking of the media (a plausible yardstick of attitudes among intellectuals),
Radio Free Europe analyst Duncan Perry concludes that "rather than stress
differences,
[the Macedonian media] appear to have emphasized common problems among
the people of the republic. Thus, although the media are at times biased,
in general responsible reporting has contributed to a reduction in ethnic
stress."94

It should be remembered that the socialist era cannot be ignored when
seeking to explain the force of nationalism in Macedonia today. The period
from 1945 to 1995 is actually quite continuous with respect to the fundamental
desires which result in nationalism; 1989 merely changed the means of satisfying
that desire. A comparison with the economic sphere is enlightening: under
socialism, the market was limited, so people became accustomed to having
many unfulfilled desires (although they may have continued to voice them
discreetly). In 1989 the markets were opened, so that people now have the
opportunity to satisfy far more of their desires than was previously possible.95
A similar dynamic is at work in the realm of ideas. Nationalist desire
has existed in Macedonia ever since the late nineteenth century; it is
only the markets for its fulfillment that have changed.

The desire which results in nationalism is often vague and not easily
defined, but one feature that stands out is the desire for unity. Whether
it be in the form of a united Macedonia, or in a "Macedonia for the Macedonians,"
the nationalists in both socialist and post-socialist Macedonia have sought
oneness. Within the Macedonian context, moreover, the satisfaction of this
desire has been identified with institutionalization of the unity. The
word "people"becomes a singular rather than a plural noun. It is
therefore not surprising that the same constitutional logic which enshrined
national differences in socialist Yugoslavia should be repeated in independent
Macedonia. Until the desire which results in nationalism can be satisfied
through civic, rather than institutional, means, minorities will continue
to feel excluded, and Macedonians will continue to feel threatened.

Note 2: The title "Internal
Macedonian Revolutionary Organization" (Vnatre?na Makedonska revolucioerna
organizacija) was actually not adopted officially until 1905 -- prior
to that time at least half a dozen different names were used. Though I
may be faulted for inaccuracy, for simplicity's sake I have chosen to employ
IMRO throughout this essay rather than the Macedonian VMRO. This
is in keeping with the practice of most English-language historians writing
on the subject. (See Duncan Perry, The Politics of Terror: The Macedonian
Revolutionary Movements, 1893-1903 [Durham, North Carolina: Duke University
Press, 1988], 40-41, 221 n. 10.) Back.

Note 3: It is a singular characteristic
of Balkan studies that use of the word "Macedonian" to describe a nationality
must be explained. I do not follow Kofos, who insists on calling the Slavic
inhabitants of Macedonia "Slav `Macedonians'" -- quotation marks being
a classic signal of distance and disdain. It is generally agreed among
more disinterested writers (cf. Palmer, King and Glenny) that prior to
1945, though the Slavic inhabitants of Macedonia may have identified with
Greece or Bulgaria, they were subtly distinct, in language and regional
attachment if nothing else. Accepting this understanding, I will refer
to the Slavic inhabitants of Macedonia as Macedonians throughout
this essay. Back.

Note 7: The actual number,
from 1971 to 1989, is 18.7 percent. High points were reached in 1973 and
1984, with 30 percent of each volume's articles dealing with Ilinden, and
the low point was in 1980, with only 3.4 percent of the essays discussing
the uprising. A roughly equivalent percentage of articles (17.9 percent)
deals with IMRO; the high point was 1984 (40.0 percent) and the low was
1980 (3.4 percent). Back.

Note 8: See Visinski "Macedonia's
Truth,"
Macedonian Review 2, No. 2 (1972), 141-143; and "Twenty
Years of
Macedonian Review"20, no. 1 (1990), 5-6 for discussions
of the Review's mission and audience. Also useful are two reviews
of the journal by Simo Mladenovski in Glasnik 18, nos. 1 and 2 (1974),
307, 326. Back.

Note 10: At the time of the
Uprising, the Ottoman Empire had not yet adopted the Gregorian calendar.
The convention used in this essay is to provide the Julian date first and
the Gregorian second. There is, incidentally, some confusion about this
date, with a minority of primary sources suggesting that the meeting occurred
a month or two later. October 23 is, however, the most commonly accepted
date. (See Perry, The Politics of Terror, 221 n. 5.)
Back.

Note 15: Stojan Pribicevic,
"Macedonia, Its People and History," excerpted from Macedonia, Its People
and History
(Philadelphia: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1982),
Macedonian Review 12, no. 3 (1982), 288. Back.

Note 29: Koli?evski, incidentally,
would later become an occasional contributor to the Review.
Back.

Note 30:Istorijski archiv,
Vol. 7, Makedonija u narodnooslobodilackom ratu I narodnoj revoluciji
1941-1944, Jovan Marjanovic, ed. (Belgrade: 1951), 135-140. Quoted
in Palmer and King, 70. The status of Macedonian in 1945 as an independent
language or as a dialect of Bulgarian is debatable, but what is important
here is that the proclamation was printed in it, rather than in standard
Bulgarian or Serbo-Croatian. Back.

Note 34: The left wing of
IMRO, disturbed by the organization's increasing domination by Vrhovists,
had split off on its own in 1919 under the name "Temporary representative
of the former Macedonian Revolutionary Organization." In 1925 this had
been changed to the "Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (United)."
(Ivan Katardziev, "I.M.O.R.O.," Part. 2, Macedonian Review 20, no.
3 [1990], 156-157.) Back.

Note 43: Although Goce Delcev
was killed before the start of the Uprising (on April 24/May 6, 1903),
he remained a central figure of the insurrection for having secured its
postponement and in his diligent efforts to prepare for it.
Back.

Note 49: A document published
by the Central Committee of the Macedonian Political Organization of the
U.S.A. and Canada, in 1927, proclaims for example that "the language of
the Macedonian Slavs is Bulgarian." The Macedonian Slavs: Their National
Character and Struggles
(Indianapolis, Indiana: Central Committee of
the Macedonian Political Organization of the U.S.A. and Canada, 1927),
5. Back.

Note 91: See Verdery, 189.
A characteristic peculiar to Macedonia (and a potentially stabilizing one)
is that the country has two Albanian parties, so that political
domination is not likely to be as overpowering as it would if there were
only one party for which Albanians voted en bloc.
Back.